Seeing destinations through vlogs: implications for leveraging customer engagement behavior to increase travel intention

Abstract

Purpose This study aims to understand customers’ watching experience with travel vlogs and its impacts on one of the most prominent manifestations of customer engagement behaviors (CEBs) – word-of-mouth (WOM) – and their travel intention. Drawing upon the theory of resonance, this study incorporated both cognitive and emotional aspects of travel vlog watching experience. Design/methodology/approach Online survey data were collected from 352 participants who have watched travel vlogs over the past 12 months. Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was performed for hypotheses testing. Findings The study results reveal positive impacts of source credibility, inspiration, escapism and self-congruence on WOM, which further leads to travel intention. While source credibility is the strongest predictor of WOM, more factors representing the emotional resonance turn out to be the driving factors of WOM. Research limitations/implications This study pinpoints the value of investigating audiences’ vlogs watching experience from a CEB perspective within the tourism setting. Future research is encouraged to explore more types of CEBs in the intersection of social media consumption and travel behaviors. Practical implications Travel vloggers need to convey their intrinsic passion and enthusiasm to create an emotional connection with the audiences. Hospitality and tourism marketers are recommended to promote products and services by incentivizing audiences to engage with the travel vlogs. Originality/value No prior research integrated vlogs watching experiences, engagement behavior and future travel intention in a tourism setting. This study fills this gap and contributes to the literature on customer engagement, media consumption and marketing.

The impact of the source credibility of Instagram influencers on travel intention: The mediating role of parasocial interaction

“…PSI is described as interaction of media users with people covered in the media (Grant et al, 1991;Rubin et al, 1985). This is an emotional relationship (Zhang et al, 2020). PSI can take place in various ways, such as getting guidance from a media personality, seeing the media personality as a friend, imagining himself/herself in a popular program with the media personality, or wanting to meet the media personality (Rubin et al, 1985).…”

“…Due to this effect, source credibility becomes an important driver of travel intention. According to a study by Cheng et al (2020), it can be said that high level of source credibility can cause social media users to identify the ones that are suitable for them among the many posts on social media and to show travel intentions by using the travel information that they find useful. In a study by Pornpitakpan (2004), it was determined that the sub-dimensions of source credibility were positively associated with purchase intention.…”

“…At this point, however, the credibility of SMIs, who are seen as sources of information, is extremely important in terms of the effect of the message transmitted to users (Dedeoglu, 2019). Social media users who perceive the credibility of the source as high may show the intention to travel to the destinations suggested by the resource (Cheng et al, 2020). At the same time, source credibility, which consists of 'attractiveness, trustworthiness and expertise' directly affects the parasocial relations and the future intentions of the consumers (Yuan et al, 2016).…”

Pengaruh Information Quality Dan Service Quality Terhadap Perceived Value Dan Konsekuensinya Terhadap Customer Engagement Behavior Intention (Studi Pada Social Commerce Instagram)

“…Menurut Cheng et al (2020), customer engagement behavior intention merupakan perwakilan dari keterlibatan seorang customer atau bisa disebut juga sebagai manifestasi dari perilaku customer yang memilih brand atau fokus perusahaan yang dihasilkan oleh motivasi eksternal. Customer engagement behavior intention berkaitan langsung dengan kondisi keuangan perusahaan, dimana customer engagement behavior intention mampu memberikan dukungan terhadap brand, mendorong keinginan membeli dari customer dan berkontribusi langsung dengan penghasilan perusahaan.…”

Trust Model for Online Reviews of Tourism Services and Evaluation of Destinations

“…It is also possible to implement strategic social media marketing (Felix et al 2017). Many studies document the importance of social media for destination marketing (Lange-Faria and Elliot 2012;Isa 2014, 2015;Mukherjee and Nagabhushana 2016;Rahman 2017;Bokunewicz and Shulman 2017), including the role of e-WOM (Tham et al 2013;Abubakar 2016;Ishida et al 2016;Cheng et al 2020).…”